Toughie 363

Toughie No 363 by Cephas

Get out of the Kitchen!

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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ***

As well as a trademark Geography lesson, today’s rather easy puzzle from Cephas features kitchen utensils in the wordplay.

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Across

1a    Wave from lecturer during period around teatime, say (8)
{FLOURISH} – a wave is created by putting a L(ecturer) inside the approximate time that you might have afternoon tea

5a    Wealthy elite’s rapid transport prepared (3,3)
{JET SET} – this wealthy elite is named after the rapid transport that they use regularly

9a    Drive feudal reform that is unpleasant (8)
{DREADFUL} – abbreviations for Street (St.) and Road (Rd.) are regularly found in cryptic crosswords; the abbreviation for Drive (Dr.) is equally valid but seen a lot less often – add an anagram (reform) of FEUDAL to get a word meaning unpleasant

10a    Maintenance of stronghold mounting in advance (6)
{UPKEEP} – this form of maintenance is built up from the stronghold of a castle preceded by (in advance) a short word meaning mounted on a horse – if you thought that mounting was indicating a reversal it wouldn’t work in an across clue

11a    Quartet leaving director to sign legal document (7)
{EXECUTE} – take the Roman numerals that represent a quartet from a working director (or directors) of a company to get a term used for the action of signing a legal document

12a    Need time in Oxfordshire (7)
{WANTAGE} – a charade of to need and a long time leads to a town in Oxfordshire

13a    It is used unspectacularly for seeing (3,5,3)
{THE NAKED EYE} – a cryptic definition of what you use to see without using spectacles

16a    Good to adopt as son or daughter an older person! (11)
{GRANDMOTHER} – a charade of very good and to adopt as a child leads to the parent of the person doing the adopting

21a    Tamil be preparing dish with mould! (7)
{TIMBALE} – an anagram (preparing) of TAMIL BE gives a dish of meat, fish, etc. cooked in a cup-shaped mould

22a    Beat, half of this removed first by versifier (7)
{RHYMIST} – take a word meaning a musical beat then remove the first half of TH(IS) and add the abbreviation for first to get a versifier

23a    The general retreats inside to withdraw (6)
{RENEGE} – hidden inside, reversed (retreats), the first two words is a word meaning to withdraw or renounce

24a    Smallest bit Theo removed at very high temperature (5-3)
{WHITE-HOT} – combine the smallest bit of something with an anagram (removed) of THEO to get a very high temperature

25a    Bird’s spirit? (6)
{PECKER} – a double definition – the second one being something that you need to keep up – many years ago I was working in Washington DC when one of the staff there received a letter from the English branch of the company which ended with the common phrase using this word; I was asked what was meant as in the US it was a somewhat ruder phrase!

26a    Protesting about riding wearing sleeves? (2,2,4)
{UP IN ARMS} – a phrase that means protesting about something is a charade of riding (same usage as in 10 across) followed by how you could describe wearing sleeves

Down

1d    Female having more unusual stuff to eat (6)
{FODDER} – combine F(emale) with a word meaning more unusual to get stuff to eat (or to input into an anagram!)

2d    Exposed leading journalist who had nothing to write at the beginning (6)
{OPENED} – a synonym for exposed is built up from a leading journalist on a newspaper preceded by nothing and a word meaning to write

3d    Unexpectedly subeditor is leaving fieldwork (7)
{REDOUBT} – an anagram (unexpectedly) of (S)UBED(I)TOR without the letters I and S (IS leaving) gives a fieldwork enclosed on all sides

4d    Press in and win narrowly (7,4)
{SQUEEZE HOME} – a double definition

6d    Sweep vessels into river (7)
{EXPANSE} – a sweep or range is built up by putting vessels used for cooking inside a river that flows mostly through Gazza’s home county of Devon

7d    Notice cut when it moved up and down (8)
{SEESAWED} – a charade of to notice and cut, as in cut some wood, gives moved up and down on a toy for two children – Chambers gives the enumeration as (8) while the ODE gives (3-5)

8d    Number one even at the highest plane (3-5)
{TOP-LEVEL} – another charade – this time number one in the charts combined with a word meaning even gives the highest plane

12d    Forecaster’s craft? (7,4)
{WEATHER SHIP} – a slightly cryptic definition of a craft engaged in meteorological work

14d    A fool giving support to communist opinions (8)
{AGITPROP} – combine A with a fool and a support to get this communist propaganda / opinions

15d    Musical choirman’s out of tune (8)
{HARMONIC} – a word meaning musical is an anagram (out of tune) of CHOIRMAN

17d    Soaked bed left trail (7)
{DRAGGLE} – start with a word meaning soaked or dishevelled and remove the letters of BED from the outside to get this uncommon word for to trail

18d    Rogers’ weight in Hertfordshire (7)
{ROYSTON} – it is at this point that, if you haven’t already guessed, this puzzle is probably by Cephas – the Rogers in question was a cowboy who feature his horse Trigger on his shows – take the possessive form of his first name and add a large weight to get a town in Hertfordshire

19d    More productive kitchen utensil husband included (6)
{RICHER} – to get this word meaning more productive take a kitchen utensil with small holes through which boiled potatoes or other soft food can be pushed and insert H (Husband included)

20d    Standing sculptures English cast aside (6)
{STATUS} – a synonym for standing or importance is found by taking sculptures and removing E (English cast aside)

I probably wasn’t the only one that found this a bit easier than today’s regular cryptic.

If you thought that Shake, Rattle and Roll was a Little Richard original you score null points (and if you thought it was Elvis you get -100 points).  Here’s the man who did it first: